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An Annoying Sort of Friend

This is a mystery … we hope:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) said Monday that he’d be willing to sign a 20-week abortion ban without exceptions for rape or incest, adding that women were mostly concerned about those issues “in the initial months” of pregnancy, television station WKOW reported.

“I mean, I think for most people who are concerned about that, it’s in the initial months where they’re most concerned about it,” Walker said of pregnancies caused by rape and incest.

“In this case, again, it’s an unborn life, it’s an unborn child and that’s why we feel strongly about it,” Walker said. “I’m prepared to sign it either way that they send it to us.”

We are possibly witnessing a spaghetti-meet-wall moment in conservative politics as the various factions of social conservatism dealing with sex and gender undergo what seems a complete meltdown. Mr. Walker is emblematic. The Cowardly Clown decided to come out swinging on this issue, going on conservative radio to explain that using force of law to put things in women’s vaginas was “just a cool thing out there”. And for whatever reason, he wants this fight; he went back to the same radio program to push his case. It was a particularly dishonest sleight, at that, suggesting the law “doesn’t designate which type” of ultrasound, but transvaginal is the standard medical procedure. Additionally, as Steve Benen explained, “no one’s opposed to ultrasounds in general, but plenty of people are opposed to state-mandated, medically unnecessary procedures imposed by right-wing politicians who choose to interfere with the doctor-patient relationship as part of a larger culture war”.

Remember that the purpose of this is to subject women to an unnecessary medical procedure, the standard method involving vaginal penetration by a foreign object, under force of law and with the intention of persuasion.

Yet Mr. Walker is not finished finding ways to molest women for the sake of his own moral satisfaction.

“I mean, I think for most people who are concerned about that, it’s in the initial months where they’re most concerned about it,” Walker said of pregnancies caused by rape and incest.

“In this case, again, it’s an unborn life, it’s an unborn child and that’s why we feel strongly about it,” Walker said. “I’m prepared to sign it either way that they send it to us.”

There are a couple of things about what Mr. Walker said worth noting. First is the duh factor. Yeah, usually there are lots of concerns about pregnancies in the initial months after a rape. But this is the guy who wants to turn around and stick stuff in a woman’s vagina, anyway, so let us simply remember what his statement of the obvious is actually worth.

But second is the unspoken part. Yeah, most people. But Mr. Walker is perfectly content to screw over the rest, regardless of their reasons, which aren’t his business in the first place. This is a disgrace; the Pokey Badger does not merely pretend that women should justify themselves to him, but also deliberately ignores the countless iterations of reasons that should not be subject to his approval, anyway. Then again, of all his disrespectful behavior, ignoring what other people are actually saying is somewhere down the list. In the end, this is also a matter of priorities.

This is all about trying to coerce women. You know, because it’s “just a cool thing that’s out there”.

You know how parents sometimes say, “You don’t need those kinds of friends”? Scott Walker sounds like the kind of friend your vagina doesn’t want and never asked for.α

The strangest thing is that for all the basic, low-effort politicking the Cowardly Clown hopes to dodge, this is the issue he wants to fight over. A losing issue, shot through with indignity and disrespect, and visited in one of the most callous manners seen since, well, the last presidential election cycle. Why? It’s one thing to pitch hard right. It’s one thing to pitch on a conscience issue. But to do it in such a haphazard, even dangerous way? Have they thought this through? We might hope not, else Mr. Walker really has no excuse.

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α Then again, neither am I a woman. Who am I to say? I mean, this just seems like a really crass and belligerent way to go about pushing a traditional conservative issue, as if Mr. Walker hopes to be as hurtful as possible wielding a losing policy plank like a bludgeon.